Premiering exclusively via The Wire, the documentary looks at the use of the organ in contemporary music

The Organ: A Modern Classic aims to highlights the various ways in which artists such as Squarepusher, Anna Von Hausswolff and Oneohtrix Point Never are adapting the instrument for contemporary music.

Created by music, art and culture platform Cone Magazine, the documentary “explores the social and political barriers that artists and composers may face when trying to work with the organ, and delves deep into the anatomy of the instrument”.

The Friedenskirche, a church in Eupen, hosted to the “Touch Presents…” program, featuring two organ concerts by Claire M. Singer and The Eternal Chord and a live performance by Philip Jeck. Claire M. Singer’s 2016 debut Solas spans 14 years of her work in acoustic and electronic composition. Together with Mike Harding, she is also a member of The Eternal Chord, a project that focuses on the sonic power of the organ. Philip Jeck started working with record players and electronic instrumentation in the 80s and is renowned for his soundtracks, music for theatre and dance companies and solo concert work.

This concert was recorded and the entry fee guarantees you a free copy of some of the recordings [wav files]. Which tracks we make available will depend on the quality and suitability of the recordings, of course…

Recorded on 1st November 2013 as part of Bergen Kirkeautunnale, Norway

Featuring BJNilsen & John Beaumont’s Black Death, a new project using voice (tenor) and electronics; Charles Matthews’s repertoire includes performances of organ pieces by Arvo Pärt, Giacinto Scelsi and Johan Sebastian Bach; Marcus Davidson’s Ananta is released for the first time, and Spire regulars The Eternal Chord and The Spire Ensemble also perform.
This cassette will be released in July 2014

Recorded at St. Stephan’s Church, Mautern, Austria as part of Spire live at The Kontraste Festival, Krems, 11th October 2013.

Marcus Davidson – Organ & Electronics

EVP samples by Raymond Cass from “The Ghost Orchid – An Introduction to EVP” [PARC CD1]
NASA recording of the winds of Saturn from The Voyager Spacecraft
Natural VLF Radio Phenomena of the Magnetosphere and space weather recording by S.P. McGreevy
With thanks to Charles Matthews

2. Sacred Space 9:17

Recorded at PassionsKirche, Berlin, Germany as part of CTM12 Festival, 5th February 2012
Marcus Davidson – Electronics
Charles Matthews – Organ
Part one: Notations from the NASA recordings of the Rings of Uranus
Part two: The Sun dawning over the dark rings of Uranus

As part of the Spire project, Touch is pleased to announce this download-only release by

Daniel Menche.

“I work at a high school library here in Portland, Oregon. Once a week there’s a choir class and occasionally I will poke my head in to hear the fantastic sounds of the kids singing. The singing can be a bit rusty mainly due to the shyness factor in their young voices and the reluctant learning of the music notation from the choir teacher. I really liked hearing that rough-awkward singing from the kids and it remind me of myself being in a choir as a little kid and remembering how much I HATED IT! Mainly because I didn’t understand music notation… nor did I want to and also I was incredibly shy just like these kids.

Well anyways I’m always thinking of ways to get young folks to have fun with sound and such and also I had an idea to use these fine choir students for a recording utilizing their awkward singing sounds. My strategy for the kids was vowels because every kid knows vowels! A-E-I-O-U and just sing those letters as long as possible is what I will instruct the kids to do. I mentioned to the choir teacher that I will be coming in and taking ten minutes of the student’s time to record them for a recorded composition and the teacher approved with this idea but she was also very confused. How can I be a known recording musician and not know about music notation such as ‘flat C or sharp D’ or whatever that jargon is. I told them… “Don’t worry… kids will have fun and it’ll sound fantastic.” And so I barged into the classroom and hit record on my little recorder and began the vowel singing game with the kids. The sheer state of confusion on their young faces was rather beautiful and the singing was fantastic to my ears. I noticed immediately that they couldn’t get the low sounds very well because well… they’re kids and baritone sounds just aren’t in the picture yet for them. So I utilized a Hammond organ for the bass sounds for the final piece of music titled “HOVER”.

Included is the raw unedited “as is” recording document of myself having fun with the kids and getting sounds out of them for this “HOVER” recording. This raw recording has a charm to it of the kids being confused and having some fun. Teenage cathartic-ism to say the least. The look on the choir teacher’s face when I had everyone screaming in different vowels was priceless. I can see her facial expression screaming at me “Music notation blasphemy!!!”… I respond back “Yep, sure is and now look at all the smiles on our kids faces.”

Enrico Coniglio is a Venetian musician who focuses his musical research on the representation of the contemporary landscapes. In relation to his studies in urban planning (University IUAV of Venice), his interest is directed towards the loss of identity of places and the uncertainty of the evolution of the urban territory. If his music comes mainly from the ambient genre, mixing a droning guitar with field recordings and digital manipulation, on the other hand he’s just interested to document the landscape, meaning to build his personal catalogue of soundscapes, with a particular reference to the Venetian lagoon.

Over the last year he has collaborated with various musicians including Joachim Roedelius, Arve Henriksen, Oophoi and others, and he has releases and podcasts with Psychonavigation, Glacial Movements, Cronica electronica and Laverna net. You can hear a previous release “Sapientumsuperacquis” on Touch Radio.

The present release is a long-drone track mostly based on recordings made in Porto Marghera, a big industrial coastal area on the mainland of Venice, Italy (Winter 2009), now largely on disposal and afflicted by a severe economic and environmental crisis. Part of this work was originally used for a sound work in the “Antares” pavilion of VEGA Park (VEnice GAteway for science and technology) for a photography exhibition as a part of the project “Le nuove vie di Porto Marghera”. Other field recordings were made in Vienna, Austria (December 2009), in an attempt to explore the sacral spaces of the city. ‘Song from ruined days’ is a mix of industrial and liturgical soundscape, a brief journey in the space of a full desolation.

“Enrico Coniglio is among the best kept secrets of the Italian ambient scene”
(Roberto Mandolini, Rockerilla)
“He deals in a warm, soothing blend of guitar drones, field recordings and digital post-production” (Ewan Burke, Cyclic Defrost Magazine)
“Coniglio’s atmospheres, meanwhile, take turns at being ethereal and lightflooded, obscured by clouds, ominous and abstract” (Tobias Fischer, Tokafi)
“Enrico Coniglio creates a series of absorbing ambiences that have a moody enigmatic quality about them – dark, deep pools of sound morphing crackling in places with electrical damage” (Morpheus Music Reviews).
“Coniglio’s multi-varied collection provides a rich and oft-surprising listening experience”
(Textura)
“This is a must have for ambient DJs!”
(Mixmaster Morris)

Side Three
BJNilsen – Live in Masthuggs Church, Göteborg
[as part of the GAS Festival] 4th October 2005
19:36

Side Four
Fennesz – Live in St. Michel & St. Gudula Cathedral, Brussels
[as part of Les Nuits Botaniques] 7th May 2006
16:02

Spire Live – Fundamentalis is a collection of live tracks recorded at various Spire events held throughout 2005 and 2006. Released in association with US label, Autofact, Touch presents a selection of tracks performed by the main performers of Spire: Fennesz | Philip Jeck | BJNilsen | Charles Matthews | Marcus Davidson. Improvised pieces from Fennesz, BJNilsen and Philip Jeck contrast with a performance by Charles Matthews of a scored composition by Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi, ‘In Nomine Lucis’, and Marcus Davidson’s self-penned ‘Standing Wave’, which ends side two with a locked groove. Cut to preserve and enhance the bottom end frequencies, Fundamentalis is not merely a document; the tension between and within the individual pieces is palpable. Fennesz’s set “…evokes the rolling centuries in all their pain and beauty, leaving us at once becalmed and energised, but never oppressed under the weight of time.” Electronics breathe new life not only into the organ, but also into the setting. But successor does not mean replacement. Ultimately, it’s the majestic sound of the organ, so steeped in centuries of tradition, that one remembers above all else.

Spire is one of the most innovative projects around, drawing on the full canon of organ works, from the very first annotation in the Robertsbridge Codex from the 14th Century, to max msp patches and software sampling… With two CD releases and 9 performances in cathedrals and churches throughout Europe, Spire remains a potent live force in harnessing the sounds of the ages.

“The Touch label’s Spire project is all about restating the sonic power of the church organ in the modern age, pushing this awesome instrument to its terrifying limits. This majestic collection of live tracks, recorded in churches and cathedrals across Europe, unites organ maestros like Charles Matthews with such Touch-endorsed electronic explorers as BJ Nilsen, Fennesz and Philip Jeck, to create a euphoric drone of power, calm and beauty, that, played loudly enough in a far-away room, will soothe the chattering clamour of the urban brain.”

Contact

Spire

The Organ - The Emperor of Instruments

"The tall peaceful trees would be like the pipes of a great organ…" (Claude Debussy)

It is impossible to overestimate the influence of the organ on the history of music and sound. From its earliest inception as the Hydraulis, to the bellows organs of the late Roman period, its absence from western music until the 8th Century to its development during the Middle Ages, the organ developed along with technological progress; the Portative Organ was portable; the Positive Organ could play polyphonic music and could rest on a table; and the Church Organ, which played the lowest and loudest notes and was permanently built into churches. But it was not until at least the tenth century that Church approval was given for Christian use of the organ.

It would be churlish to ignore the religious use of the instrument, but we should remember that for the first thousand years of use, the organ was not directly associated with the Church. Its acceptance by the Christian authorities had as much to do with absorbing or allying to sectarian political power [no jokes about who has the biggest organ please!] as the obvious manipulation of the audience when the instrument's sonic power was understood.

Having spent many enforced hours in churches or chapels when I was younger, listening to and studying the organ was often the only relief from the tedium of the church service itself. But it was also a source of great frustration that the organ players clearly never pushed the instrument to its limits, although the school organist loved nothing more than to break into a solo voluntary. Obviously they were as bored as I was.

Being fortunate enough to spend plenty of downtime with some of the most interesting sound explorers around, the subject of producing a compilation where the tracks were all either inspired by or more directly influenced by the organ has been frequently aired over the years. The conversations were always animated and expansive. The organ works of Arvo Pärt, particularly those performed by Christopher Bowers-Broadbent, a pupil of Richard Rodney Bennett at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and others have reached a wider non-classical audience. So Benny Nilsen was inspired to visit St. Mary's Church, Warwick and work with one of England's finest, Charles Matthews. Crawling around inside the instrument, positioning microphones most appropriately in the Church, or 'capturing' the psalms composed by Marcus Davidson, Nilsen explored the possibilities with all the familiar lusts of the avant-garde.

As the brief widened, so did the responses… some contributors referred to earlier versions of the organ and its often highly political usage, others explored aged instruments themselves. Some studied the effects of the sounds produced on the physique and the psyche, and others conceptualised the brief and either built their own or recorded natural or man-made phenomena which utilised the same basic process - wind through pipes.

But it is impossible not to be drawn upward, whether towards the spire of the church or cathedral or to the huge and daunting forest of pipes themselves. The organ dwarfs all comers, and unlike other instruments, it is this non-musical element which makes the organ stand apart. [Mike Harding]